§ Mr. JAMES PARKER (for Mr. William Thorne)asked the President of the Local Government Board whether he is aware that, according to the report of the medical officer of health for the Borough of Croydon for 1908, numerous cess-pools in the Croydon Rural District are in direct communication with water-bearing strata from which drinking-water is derived; that the local authorities do not attempt to put into operation the model building bye-laws of the Local Government Board, which insist on builders making cess-pools watertight; that cess-pools in the district are allowed to be built in defiance of the bye-laws and in such a way as to encourage the direct flow of sewage under 20 or 30 feet of pressure into porous chalk; and that within the Croydon drainage areas there were in 1907, according to the borough engineer's report, 249 houses drained by cess-pools which were and are capable of being connected with the sewers; is he aware that the medical officer has urged the necessity of safeguarding and extending the present water supply; and seeing that in January, 1908, the Croydon Corporation laid the facts before the Local Government Board, will he say what action the Board has taken or proposes to take in the matter, and what assistance or advice the Board can give on the whole question of water supply from the chalk?
§ Mr. BURNSI am aware of the reports of the medical officer of health and borough engineer referred to in the question. I communicated with the rural district council, and was informed that they had succeeded in persuading a considerable proportion of the owners concerned to connect their premises with the public sewers. I advised them as to the powers which they possessed for dealing with cases where such connections had not been made, and I subsequently issued an Order conferring upon them certain additional powers under the Public Health Acts Amendment Act, 1907. Further, I am causing some scientific investigations to be made with regard to chemical means of purifying chalk waters. I am fully alive to the importance of the subject.